so as i understand it most olympic weightlifters and serious strength athletes will train several times per week, some of them even several times per day.

these guys might not look like professional bodybuilders, but they are very LARGE men with LOTS of muscle. I suspect a good deal of them could become top amatuer bodybuilders if they changed up their diet and training and drug intake a little bit and started flexing more often.

and I have been thinking that i could probably benefit from increasing my volume and frequency of training.

i figure that if i can lift a heavy weight for lots of volume and do it on a daily basis, that i would probably be a lot more muscular (and in a lot better shape - both bodyfat % and cardiovascular).

of course at first i would be training when sore. and just be generally overtrained and very sore all the time. but i think once i adapt id probably experience a big jump in progress.

i already take lots of rest between each set, dont train till failure, and give myself an adequate warm up with light weight and a lot of reps (lots of rest between warm up sets tooo). and i would continue to take at least a few minutes between each set, always stay away from failure, and do a thorough warm up before my workouts. focusing on a mix of rep ranges.. some 10-15, some 6-8, some 1-3.

I'd suggest you look up some Olympic lifting routines, those guys tend to focus on form and singles, not so much high reps per set. Same with strength athletes, mostly concerned about one particular thing, explosiveness or endurance.

I'd suggest you look up some Olympic lifting routines, those guys tend to focus on form and singles, not so much high reps per set. Same with strength athletes, mostly concerned about one particular thing, explosiveness or endurance.

I'd suggest you look up some Olympic lifting routines, those guys tend to focus on form and singles, not so much high reps per set. Same with strength athletes, mostly concerned about one particular thing, explosiveness or endurance.

That's what makes strongman so fun, it's a mixture of all.

yeah. i got my ex girlfriend into lifting while we were together. she joined an olympic lifting team, she would always tell me about her practices. it was mainly singles.

what do you think about lots of volume and lots of frequency with a mix of rep ranges like i decribed ? a few hours a day, muscles get hit every other day.

The most important thing to consider is why Olympic weightlifters train this way.

Olympic weightlifting is a sport that requires skill, and just like any other skill sport out there it requires practice. So the more often they practice their sport the better they get at it.

Now when you look at the lifts themselves they are very different from traditional BB and powerlifting movements. They are explosive, not necessarily because they are trained that way but because they literally have to be. You cannot grind out reps on Olympic movements. They also don't have a negative portion to them. These two things alone will allow you to train movements like the Olympic lifts more frequently without straining your recovery too much.

I am not saying that what you are trying to do is pointless, but you are going to have be very careful on how hard you go each workout. You have to plan these things out and there will be quite a bit of trial and error on how hard to push it and on what days.

.... Or you can just hit the weights 3-4 times a week like you mean it, and add some conditioning sessions according to how much bodyfat you want to drop.

Well I love lifting weights and I have always felt that its a shame that I can't spend hours in the gym everyday and make progress in size and strength. But it would be so awesome to be able to do that. Just be a weightlifting machine. Able to lift a bunch of weght withbgood bodybuilding form for a ton a volume on a daily basis. Just he a cmplete animal and have tremendos exercise capacity. Plus it makes sense to me that m mscles would have to get much lager than they ate now in order to accmlish that. I thni t would require lots of carbs for sure. I'm very interested in hearing if amyne has xxerience with this.

yeah. i got my ex girlfriend into lifting while we were together. she joined an olympic lifting team, she would always tell me about her practices. it was mainly singles.

what do you think about lots of volume and lots of frequency with a mix of rep ranges like i decribed ? a few hours a day, muscles get hit every other day.

I'm not big on mixing rep ranges constantly as in each workout, but I have found that varying them weekly and running that type of workout cycle has worked for me. However even on a light week I prefer to stay in the 8 rep range so I'm not the best to speak on high volume.

Honestly though if volume and frequency is your interest, try giant sets like I did this past week. Insane cardio and muscle pump.

I'm not big on mixing rep ranges constantly as in each workout, but I have found that varying them weekly and running that type of workout cycle has worked for me. However even on a light week I prefer to stay in the 8 rep range so I'm not the best to speak on high volume.

Honestly though if volume and frequency is your interest, try giant sets like I did this past week. Insane cardio and muscle pump.

I like Tri-sets for shoulders. Giant sets can be done with 4-6 exercises. you can do them for a single muscle group or antagonistic muscle groups and that works well for say chest+back or biceps+triceps. In fact reading this i think i will do it today for chest+back with 4 exercises...

thanks for the responses guys. i have been trying to increase my volume and frequency. so far it seems i do better if i do a real high volume workout one day, then do an "active recovery workout" 2 days after which consists of very light weights and lots of down time between sets and lots of stretching but lots of volume. on avergage i am spending 3-4 hours in the gym. but progress is good.

Best way to see if it works for you is to just formulate a plan and give it a shot.

The thing to consider though is that oly lifters such as the Chinese and Russians use a lot of recovery measures. Daily massages, saunas, low stress levels overall and of course the genetics for great durability and recovery capacity. As far as the training goes the overall volume per lift is typically a lot lower than a bodybuilder's....but China is kind of changing that up in the past 10 years with their emphasis on assistance/bodybuilder work.

I think it would be a good idea to slowly ramp your volume over a few weeks up to your goal amount of time in the gym, and de-load every 5-8 weeks possibly by training less frequent for a week or just taking a few days off in a row. The reason being the recovery time of soft tissue. Muscles and your nervous system may be ready to go again pretty frequently, but soft tissue and joints will take a beating at some point. I feel like the biggest risk with high freq/high volume training is just overuse injuries. I got some fucked up tendinosis in my tricep tendon doing this type of training for about 3 months. Didn't take proper prehab/rehab + deload precautions.

Keep that stuff in mind + staying way away from failure a majority of the time and it should work out I would think.

If you (tbombz) or anyone else want some insight into the Chinese Oly system, I highly suggest you read these links:

Also take note of how PL programs like Sheiko are structured. Look at the waving of the volume, intensity, and how the programs build up over a long period of time to a high level of frequency and volume.

Think your working on the premise that more is better, which in most cases, it is not. Feel free to spend 3-4 hours in a gym, but that would never suggest that your are training at your most affective level. This in regards to max muscle gains and steady progression in any workout. You can take 3 or 4 exercise, and if performed correctly, will totally produce a very intense workout and excellent results in new muscle mass and advance the strength from workout to workout. And requiring from 45 minute to a little over an hour to accomplish. The time factor can extremely important in a workout geared toward the max effort and results.

Prizm offers excellent insight into training by Olympic lifters, which may transfer to BB'ing movements. Though the exercise selections will be very important and even limited to some body parts. BB'ers in the past, have had success with working out twice a day. A friend in college trained 3 times a day, 3 times a week (squat mornings-bench ,before lunch-BB row after dinner time) for around 4-5 months, and got results. Though it became somewhat on a mental drain after awhile I was told. Did the always valuable 5X5's.

So might take Prizm's good advice and give it a shot. But plan with care, apply logic and curb you enthusiasm (also a great show on HBO). . The CNS will be the key to recovery, from workout to workout, and as you already know, never complete a set to the point of failure.

For max muscle intense training recruitment, I might suggest something along the lines of partial training. The tonnage lifted + time + force/effort , all allowing the most weight lifted at the strongest point of muscle contraction. All with regards to the three phase contraction position of a muscle. Or the three phase (start, middle, finish)set of reps, preformed in a power rack. Both of these methods, I hold in the highest regards for adding power and muscle mass. It's the overload system taken to a higher level. Might suggest "Power Factor Training" by Little & Sisco. Though the book is badly edited, the process is explained very well. The pic's include should inspire any BB'er. Good Luck.

Side Bar: Olympic lifers are the elite athletes of weight training. A PL'er (whom I also have great respect for), is only requires to move a weight a few feet, as opposed to an Olympic lifter who lifts a weight from the floor to arms length overhead..and holds that position.

I'd suggest you look up some Olympic lifting routines, those guys tend to focus on form and singles, not so much high reps per set. Same with strength athletes, mostly concerned about one particular thing, explosiveness or endurance.

I think oly lifters can perform often because their total volume per workout is so low a.d reps are explosive so not a ton muscle damage. The guys who do get large are fast twitch dominant the majority of their god given muscle fibers will hypertrophy with such training, whereas the average joe may never see much growth from oly lifting. Strength sure. Cns strength.

For bodybuilding I dont see an oly schedule being compatible. Bbing tears down individual muscle groups which need several days recovery. Your ability to adapt to bbing training is limited as far as frequency since the recovery mechanism for repairing damaged fibers isnt as "trainable" as is CNS efficiency.

i was training on a 2 day split, 2 on 1 off, everything getting hit every 3rd day. could do real high volume one workout, but would have to go very light the next. was working okay, but do to my desire to do more volume i have broken up my workout into a 4 day split, continuous with no days off, everything getting hit every 4th day. although ill probably take a day or two off here and there in the future. working good. staying away from failure and focusing on form helps. plus a good warm up, not exhausting, just a few sets real good form, real light weight, only 10-15 reps each set. real easy but enough weight to get blood in there and get ready for the workout. then hit it hard but focus on form and dont go to failure. this has been working good for me.